


Her Dear Companion

by shopfront



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Regency, F/F, Friends to Lovers, Love Confessions, Secret Crush, Slice of Life, unexpected courtship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-11
Updated: 2019-08-11
Packaged: 2020-07-29 11:41:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,118
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20081617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shopfront/pseuds/shopfront
Summary: It is a truth universally acknowledged that a young Muggleborn witch in want of Muggle income or Wizarding connections must be in search of a useful acquaintance.





	Her Dear Companion

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Entwinedlove](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Entwinedlove/gifts).

Hermione twitched as she watched Luna accept the offered card and letter. A half-eaten piece of toast still dangled from Luna’s other hand, and both the card and the note were quickly discarded without even being read properly. 

“Anything of interest?” Hermione asked, trying to feign a lack of concern that she certainly didn’t feel.

Not that anyone other than the servants would have noticed. Mr Lovegood, Hermione was disappointed to note, was busy talking the ear off a rather unhappy looking delivery boy through the window and attracting stares from passersby on the street. He didn’t even seem to realise a note had arrived at the breakfast table.

“Just another invitation,” Luna replied as she polished off the last of her breakfast.

Hermione blinked. Then she wet her lips and aimed again for a casual tone. “From anyone of import?”

“I don’t think so. No one can be more important than our search of the park for Blibbering Humdingers. But here, you can read it if you want,” Luna said as she waved her wand to waft the pages across the table.

Once she had the letter in hand, Hermione suddenly regretted wanting to know. The card was from the youngest Miss Warbeck, great niece to the very grand Lady Celestina Warbeck, and the accompanying note written by Miss Brocklehurst, a school friend of Luna’s who was apparently staying with Miss Warbeck and hoped to see them. It was just the sort of introduction Hermione had been hoping for. It was also exactly the sort of invitation she'd watched Luna turn down every morning since they’d arrived in town.

When Hermione had sought a role as a lady’s companion after Hogwarts, she’d rather hoped to accompany someone older. Perhaps a lady with her sons and daughters already married off or successfully placed in proper wizarding professions, who would have far greater connections than Hermione herself could boast of. Someone willing to guide her through the complicated new social expectations that no book had successfully illuminated for her so far, no matter how many times she’d desperately searched the Hogwarts library for such a text.

But Hermione had refused to be daunted. When her professors had suggested that she brave London, promising that her wit and intelligence would surely produce a suitable profession from her social circle, she had sought a suitable place at once. She apparently needed only to take up residence somewhere wizarding society could easily call upon her, and make herself known.

But there in had lain the difficulty. One which no Muggle family relation could assist her with.

In the end the Lovegoods had been very kind and generous indeed to have her at their small estate and eventually to bring her to town. Indeed, Luna had proved eager to procure any book Hermione spoke of. Between that and a diverting countryside to walk in, it had been an almost pleasant break after Hermione’s studies.

All the same, she was happy to be in town. Even if some mornings the household did strike her as rather more of a trial than a blessing.

“Are you sure we shouldn’t go? Perhaps it might be a good opportunity to investigate your Rotfang conspiracy?” she asked, not really expecting to sway Luna’s opinion.

But to Hermione’s surprise Luna furrowed her brow and looked thoughtful. “It is perfect weather for catching Humdingers,” she replied. But she said the words slowly, with great uncertainty, and Hermione seized the opportunity to press her advantage.

“Oh, but we’ve only just arrived in town this week! There’ll far more days with weather like this ahead of us. But Miss Brocklehurst won’t be the guest of Miss Warbeck all season, and we’ll have few opportunities to question someone like her.” _Especially if you decline every worthwhile invitation_, she also thought but didn’t say.

She hadn’t tried to press the question quite so directly on other mornings. The invitations those days hadn't seen worth it when Luna knew quite clearly what she liked and where she wanted to be. Hermione had already long despaired of directing her towards more socially acceptable pursuits, but this morning something seemed different. There was a look in Luna’s eye that Hermione didn’t recognise.

“I suppose that might be fun,” Luna eventually said with a smile. She paid Hermione’s stunned stare no mind as she got to her feet. “Shall I send Agnes to assist you before we leave?”

Hermione glanced down at her silk day dress. It was a favourite - if only for its usefulness at negating any concerns that she might prove accidentally underdressed - and far too opulent to justify wearing for a day at home or even out to the park. Yet she lived in hope each morning that she chose it. While it hadn’t seen much worthwhile use yet, it did at least usually provoke a comment from Luna over how pretty she looked.

Today it would finally be perfect. “I think I can manage,” she said faintly.

Luna reached down to briefly touch Hermione’s fingers as she passed her on the way to the door.

“If you change your mind, just sing,” she suggested cheerily as she departed the room and left Hermione to scramble after her, eager for once to start the day’s adventures.

*

But to both her disappointment and secret niggling relief, Miss Warbeck was already out by the time they arrived. Hermione had succumbed a little to nerves over so unexpected yet potentially important a meeting while between the breakfast table and the Floo, and heaved a reluctant sigh of relief at the news

Instead, Miss Brocklehurst - please, you must also call me Mandy - had been eager to see them and renew her schoolyard acquaintance with Hermione. Luna, unexpectedly deprived of new avenues of Rotfang inquiry, had nonetheless happily taken herself off into the small garden and left Hermione and Mandy alone.

“We didn’t know each other well at school, but I hope that will change now that you and Luna are so dear to each other,” Mandy said after they’d quickly exhausted their few shared interests. “Oh, but I shouldn’t corner you so. Or dangle Miss Warbeck to bring you here, only to fail to produce her. My mother would scold me for forgetting my Muggle manners, but it’s such a chore to remember how things go when I’ve gotten used to the wizarding way of things now.”

Blinking, Hermione carefully put down her teacup.

“I fear Luna and I weren’t such great friends during school, either,” Mandy continuing, unnoticing. “Many in our House treated her poorly and I didn’t intervene. Now that we’re friends I feel that I must do better though, and I was so pleased when she wrote me about you. She’s such a singular creature, and she so deserves to be happy.”

“She’s been… very kind,” Hermione finally replied.

Visibly pleased, Mandy returned to praising Miss Warbeck’s furnishings. But Hermione didn’t hear a word of it. Her thoughts had already run away with her, and she couldn’t stop her eye from straying to the window and Luna beyond it where she busily hunted through the rosebushes for something.

*

“Did Mandy upset you? I thought she might have some employment she could recommend you,” Luna asked Hermione in the carriage afterwards. They’d intended to use the Floo again to return home, but had been told Miss Warbeck kept carriages in spades. Mandy had been more than eager to lend one out on her behalf once Luna had announced her desire to still try and visit the park, and couldn't be dissuaded, so the Floo had been swiftly abandoned.

Hermione bit her lip and kept her eyes fixed on the window. Muggle London streamed past them. In her distraction, Hermione almost failed to note how the once familiar fashions and affections of its people now seemed odd to her after years away. But strange it did appear to her now, even when passed at speed.

It would be very direct to say- But Luna had always been direct with her, even more so than the witches and wizards she’d met during her studies.

Determined now, she gathered her courage and her breath and turned away from the window. “No, no employment. She... commented on the _closeness_ of our friendship.”

“Oh dear. She shouldn’t have said that.” Luna’s voice was serene, but she’d cocked her head curiously and now Hermione realised that she must have been studying Hermione closely since they’d settled in the carriage. “It’s too soon. I thought you might prefer to find a profession and income of your own first. Besides, I’ve noticed how the Wrackspurts gather around you whenever I try to talk about it.”

“You thought I might… I don’t-,” Hermione said, and then stopped herself. “I’m-“

“Surprised. I know. I do tend to have that affect on people,” Luna replied.

Hermione opened her mouth, not at all sure what she was going to say but knowing she must say something. But the carriage rattled to a stop before she could find the words. Disconcerted, she watched as Luna was assisted out of the carriage. It only took her a moment to exchange words with the driver and wave off an offer to wait for them by the park entrance.

“It’s not far from here to Diagon and it’s still early. You don’t mind the extra walk, do you?” she asked Hermione as she back through the carriage door to be heard easily.

Shaking her head silently, Hermione took Luna’s hand when it was offered and followed her out and through the park gates.

“I suppose we ought to talk about it now that you know,” Luna said as they strolled. She continued before Hermione could agree or disagree, not that she was at all sure which she’d rather do. “You wouldn’t want for anything. Though I don’t expect you’ll be depending on anyone for long, not even me. But if you’d like more books before you have your own income, or if you’d prefer not to look for Humdingers or not to visit Mandy, you’d need only say.”

“I very much wanted to visit Miss Brocklehurst,” Hermione replied in a daze.

Luna brightened. “Oh, good,” she said, taking Hermione by the hand and tugging her a little ways off the path and out of the way of the other walkers. “I’d hoped as much. You hadn’t asked after an invitation like that before. I wasn’t sure if you’d like London as much as home, actually. I know how much finding a profession means to you, though, and it seemed like the best place for us to be while you figured that out.”

Hermione still didn’t know what to say, torn between embarrassment and awareness of how in the open they were. How utterly without friend in the Muggle park, should they draw the wrong sort of attention.

But as Luna’s words began to sink in, a dawning sort of warmth came across Hermione all the same. “You never said we came to London for me.”

Luna just continued to smile at her. “Didn't I ever tell you how my father didn’t think I needed a governess before Hogwarts? I never thought to take a lady’s companion, either. People expected it, with my mother gone, I know. But I never seriously thought of it until I heard you were seeking to be one. Only then did I realise the appeal."

To her horror, Hermione felt her cheeks warm and she hurriedly ducked her head, turning towards the trees and away from the open areas of the park. “I can’t believe you never said anything,” Hermione said quietly.

Luna drew closer to her.

“Our circumstances were different. You didn't know me well and I didn’t know if my feelings would deepen. I already rather thought we'd suit, but I suppose it's best to make sure. Perhaps…,” Luna trailed off, looking ruffled for the first time all day. “Perhaps you might attend Mandy’s ball with me next month? As my dear friend, I mean. Not as my companion. And perhaps, between now and then, we might see if we suit?”

If Hermione blushed harder while she nodded and Luna drew her wand, the Muggles around them were none the wiser. For Luna cast a very effective Notice-Me-Not before she raised Hermione’s fingers to her lips.

And if they forwent the Humdinger search in favour of walking the long way round to Diagon Alley to find a Floo, well. There was nobody in Muggle London of their acquaintance who would notice or miss them. Only strangers who might remark on the brightness of their eyes or the happiness in their smiles as they strolled arm in arm.


End file.
